Grizzly women's tennis faces tough regional trio in Washington
2/24/2011 12:00:00 AM | Women's Tennis
Feb. 24, 2011
The University of Montana women's tennis team will play road matches Friday through Sunday in a tour of the eastern Washington region. The Grizzlies will play Gonzaga in a 5:00 p.m. MT Friday match in Spokane, then move on to play Eastern Washington in a Cheney conference match at 11:00 a.m. Saturday, and will finally take on Idaho at 12:00 p.m in Pullman Sunday.
Friday's UM-GU event will be a rematch of the Feb. 4 meeting between the two teams. In that Bozeman neutral-site match, the Grizzlies took a 5-2 win over the Zags. Though the Grizzlies came out on top in Bozeman, the UM team was then bolstered by regional No. 17 Amada Bran, who will be sitting out this weekend's trip due to injury.
Also in the previous match-up versus GU, senior Whitney Paluch played to a three-set win at No. 4. The senior has since extended her winning streak to six, earning Big Sky Player of the Week honors along the way.
Gonzaga, a team which has historically played to close finishes with Montana, has played to a 2-5 record thus far against top regional teams such as Washington State, Santa Clara and Air Force.
Of the Spokane opponent, UM coach Steve Ascher said, "We did have a great result against Gonzaga in Bozeman. As we have seen with multiple teams this season, you cannot plan on how an opponent performs on a specific day. We expect a tough match again. This time, Gonzaga will have that luxury of a home setting, where they are always at their best."
The Friday match may allow a preview of UM's prognosis Saturday against EWU. The Bulldogs topped the Eagles 6-1 in an earlier February meeting.
Eastern Washington placed fifth last season in Big Sky standings and has thus far played to a single conference win over Idaho State. The Eagles did play to a close, 4-3 result with Portland, a team that took a 5-2 win over the Grizzlies in January duals.
Sunday's match with the 4-3 Vandal team will provide UM with its most difficult challenge of the weekend, with Idaho having faced the best regional powers in Portland, Washington State and Boise State. The Vandals defeated the Pilots 4-3.
The Grizzlies have won three of their past five matches with strength and depth through the top of the roster established as a major UM theme. In addition to Paluch's outstanding run, sophomore Constance Alexander has won five straight at Nos. 2 and 3 while Heather Davidson has moved to 6-2 while sharing the load with Alexander. Amanda Bran took a substantial win at No.1 last weekend, topping 8-1 Yuki Sugiyama of Portland State in the 6-1 UM win.
